With several other organisations, the Simon's Town Civic Association is developing a vision for the Greater Simon's Town community

Chairman’s Report – Richard Kenny

Chairmans Report March 2016

Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen. Tonight I would like to focus on the activities and progress your committee has made through the course of the year. A number of our members resigned from the committee during the year but fortunately they have been ably replaced to the extent we now have a larger and stronger committee than when we set out a year ago.

I am pleased to report that the committee is functioning well and is meeting on a monthly basis and is successfully progressing issues as they arise.

The committee has evolved through the course of the year to take on the current structure which mirrors my presentation this evening.

Our meetings are structured such that we report firstly on STANDING COMMITTEES which manage the ongoing business of the STCA.

These committees are

1 Financial

2 Membership and Communication

3 Property

4 JAM (joint association meetings)

Tim Skea will report on the financial matters and I am going to ask Merle Evertse to specifically address you on membership and communication, as I believe this is still the most important task facing the ongoing viability of the STCA.

Joint Association Meetings

As far as the JAM goes, Dan Smit who heads up this initiative has organised the first joint meeting and needs to develop this initiative further before we are able to report back on significant progress. However, your committee believes that this initiative has the potential of delivering significant co ordination to the functioning of the numerous associations operating in Simon’s Town and we intend pursuing this with vigour.

Property Portfolio

I have managed the Property Portfolio for the last year and am now in the throes of handing responsibility over to David Morgan. During the last year we reviewed 86 applications of which 77 were supported. 8 were not supported and one was withdrawn. The STCA has been actively involved with the Architectural Committee and in this regard has been ably represented by David. We were also invited to join the steering committee for the Dido Valley housing development and I attended meetings on behalf of the STCA.

I would also like to thank Merle who attended meetings of the Far South Peninsula Community Forum on our behalf.

I would now like to turn to our Key Objective Portfolios. When trying to decide where to focus our limited resources we selected three arenas where we believe we can make the most difference to the benefit of the broader community i.e.

Vagrants and by-law control

Greening of Simon’s Town

Key Stakeholder engagement

Vagrants and By-laws

W.r.t Vagrant Control we have worked closely with our ward councillor, Simon Liell-Cock, and were able to get a council-funded law enforcement officer to patrol the main street during the day. The officer’s main function is enforcement, related to non moving violations.

We have also engaged with the City on improving maintenance of order, related to vagrants and street people, and have had some successes with this. Needless to say much work remains to be done.

We also contribute to the funding a “Mach 1” guard who patrols and assists along the Main Road. WE would dearly love to do more, however our enthusiasm is curtailed by our limited budget.

Greening of Simon’s Town

Our work on theGreening Portfolio was initially concentrated on the gardens of Jubilee Square. However Brigid Jackson has started guiding the efforts of the “Green Team” job creation initiative funded by Stadco. The clean up of the Redhill viewpoint is testament to this.

We have recently expanded this initiative by contributing financially to the Glencairn wetlands.We have also been fortunate enough to have Cilla Bromley join our committee to further advance this initiative. The Browne family has also been doing sterling work in Seaforth at Waters Edge beach and supporting Karen Sternberg and Jenny Cullinan in turning Millers Walk and the walkway to Waters Edge beach into a bee friendly garden, and hopefully as we progress through the year more dedicated people will join up with us to focus on the different areas in our town.

Key Stakeholder Engagment

Key Stakeholder Engagement specifically with the Navy, is a real challenge, but we have had some success. A number of meetings with navy personnel with a view to building a trusting relationship have been held. Work continues in this area and we will not give up until all avenues have be exhausted.

We also had a number of meetings with PRASA regarding the rebuilding of the railway wall and were able to exert some pressure on expediting this work. They have done a temporary repair to the wall and are currently undertaking environmental assessments on a longterm solution.

What Makes Simon’s Town Great

Finally I would like to give feedback on the “What makes Simon’s Town Great?” initiative.

We had a very successful General Meeting to which many Simon’s Town residents came and where by means of a workshop-type exercise, the question was thouroughly explored.Community members contributions dealt with,

-What makes Simons Town Great?

-Weaknesses and Threats

-Strengths and Opportunities

The contributions were filtered so as to identify emerging themes, and these in turn were analysed to highlight the key points attracting the community’s attention. The key emerging themes that emerged are-

What makes Simon’s Town Great

-Cohesive Community

-Natural Beauty

Weaknesses and Threats

-Overdevelopment

Strengths and Opportunities

-Maritime/Navy

I present these findings today with the intention that this meeting endorses them and these are further developed by your committee as the Key Objectives to focus on for the coming year.

Finally I would like to thank the members of the STCA EXCO for the support shown to myself and to our committee, and the time and effort that they have graciously volunteered for the good of our community.

I would also like to thank all you, members of the STCA, those here tonight and those that could not make it, for supporting our community through your membership. Our Challenge this coming year is to grow our association’s membership significantly. A community “voice” is a critical component for Simon’s Town as it can contribute richly to the issues that effect us all directly.